Flooring material



March 10, 1936. .A. L. cLAPP FLOORING' MATERIAL Filed March 26, 1932 4Patented Mar. 1o, i936 FLOORING MATERIAL Albert L; Clapp, Danvers,Mass., assigner, by'

mesne assignments, to The Patent and Licensing Corporation, New York, N.Y., a corporation of Massachusetts Application March 26, 1932, SerialNo. 601,341

5 Claims. (Cl. 154-49) This application is a contnuation-in-part of myco-pending application Serial No. 662,226, filed September 12, 1923, forFlooring and basic material therefor.

The invention relates to flooring and the like, of that type whichcomprises a fibrous, felted base saturated with asphalt, bitumen, orsimilar material and then surfaced with a suitable coating. Rag' felt isoften employed as the fibrous base, but this is comparatively weak andtears and breaks easily, thus impairing the durability of the material.

One object of this invention is to produce a material of this nature ofgreater strength and durability than that having a brous base of ragfelt and which is not liable to tear or breakfrom handling. This isaccomplished by forming the fibrous base largely of long hair. By asuitable treatment, which will later be described, 4hair of originallength may be felted to form a porous readily saturated material, which,when saturated, is very tough and strong. The surface of this materialis rough and not well adapted to receive printing or other desirablensh, and hence for this reason it is desirable to face or coat thesurface with a comparatively smooth, fibrous facing layer which is welladapted to receive the finish desired without impairing the capability-of the material toreceive the saturant. The felt may be formed with alarge quantity of long hair therein and may be surfaced with cellulosicmaterial properly bonded and interfelted therewith on a multiplecylinder paper machine, one or both the outer or facing layers beingsupplied from cylinder molds at one or both ends of the machine and thehair felt from one or more intermediate cylinder molds.

A composite sheet or board embodying the invention is illustrated in theaccompanying drawing more or less conventionally, portions of thevarious laminations or layers being shown as broken away.

Referring to this gule, l indicates a ply of comparatively smoothsurfaced material such as rag felt. 2 indicates one or more plies ofhair felt, and 3 indicates another surfacing ply of smooth surfacedmaterial such as felted rag or wood pulp. 'Ihis composite material, ofwhich the layers are more or less interfelted and bonded together, isthen saturated with asphalt or other suitable resinous or bituminousmaterial as by immersing it in the melted saturant. Blown asphalt is adesirable saturant where the felt is sufficiently porous to permitproper saturation, since it is of a rubbery consistency and, does notbecome either very brittle or unduly soft within the range ofatmospheric temperatures. After cooling, any desired design may beprinted on the outer surface of either or both of the plies l or 3 bythe use-of oxidizable oil such as linseed oil and a pigment or 5 othersuitable material as at 6. While both sides of the hair felt have beenshown as surfaced with the comparatively smooth cellulosic material, itis evident that one of the surface layers may be omitted, if desired,and the uncoated face of the 10 hair felt may be dusted with talc orpowdered mica or otherwise treated to prevent it from sticking to thefloor.

'I'he following is an example of the furnishes which may be used. Thefurnish for the top or 15 top and bottom layers may be of rags only, orsulphate or sulphite pulp,rnews, or any other combination of cellulosicmaterials which may be desired, a furnish of rags only forming a verysatisfactory surfacing ply. The furnish for the 20 surfacing ply orplies is preferably well beaten so that. the resulting ply, especiallywhen calendered, presents a fine smooth surface admirably adapted forthe reception of printed designs.

The furnish for the intermediate ply or plies 25 is preferablycharacterized by a substantial proportion of long hair to give greatmechanical strength to these plies, a suitable amount of anindividualizing agent to prevent knotting and tangling of the hairs, andla substantial propor- 30 tion of pulp ber. (rag, sulphate, sulphite,etc., or mixtures thereof) to interfelt with surface bers in the facingply or plies. The presence of a substantial proportion of pulp liberensures good interfacial union between the hair plies and 35 thepulp-surfacing plies. To this end, the pulpv which is mixed with thehair to form a furnish for intermediate plies, is preferably treated sothat when the furnish is ready to be supplied to a paper-making machineto be formed into 40 a web, the pulp fiber in the furnish is hydrated toapproximately the same degree as the pulp stock supplied for thesurfacing plies. For individualizing the long hairs in the furnish, asuitable size is provided to coat the individual hairs 45 so that theyslip easily upon one another. Ordinary sizes such as rosin may beemployed, though with such size it is necessary to rely in addition ,onbeatingv the hair to prevent the hair from becoming tangled and matted.The degree of 50 beating required is suflicient to cut the hairconsiderably so that little of the hair in the furnish retains itsoriginal length. Examples of such a furnish may be as follows: parts ofhair, 20 parts of ragpulp, 30 parts of sawdust, 10 parts 55 of rosinsize, 5 parts of alum. The hair, rag pulp and sawdust are beaten uptogether suilciently to distribute the hair evenly through the masswithout cutting it more than is unavoidable in order to do this, so thatthe hair may be as long as possible. The rosin size is then added andmixed thoroughly with the stock and then lthe alum is added toprecipitate the size on the fibers. In place of the rags and sawdust, 30parts of sulphate pulp and 10 parts of wood flour`may be substituted.Another furnish which may be used comprises 50 parts of hair, 50 partsof wood our, 10 parts of rosin size and 5 parts of alum, the size andthe alum being added as above described. v

Where the pulp for the hair felt portion, is made from these furnishes,it is impossible to maintain any considerable quantity of the hair oforiginal length, since it is necessary to bring the beater knives harddown to prevent the hair from being matted, as otherwise thick and thinspots in the felt are produced, and this hard beating cuts the hair intorelatively short lengths.

A considerable quantity of hair of original length may be successfullyincorporated in the felt provided a material is added capable ofindividualizing the hair so that it may be separated and uniformly mixedin the pulp without the necessity of the hard beating required for thefurnishes above mentioned and this without cutting the hair. Suchindividualizing may be accomplished by the use of a slimy material suchas short hair beaten up hard with a caustic soda solution until the hairis more or less dissolved and reduced to a slimy mass, which howevercontains some relatively short hair. To this mixture may be added kthelong hair which may thus be individualized thereby and distributed by amuch less pressure of the beater knives on the bed plate than with thefurnishes previously described. The beater .knives may be so adjusted asto comb out the long hair without cutting it so that practically all ofit may finally appear in and be distributed evenly throughout the feltedproduct in its original length. The method and furnishes foraccomplishing this are more fully describedand claimed in my Patent No.1,673,967. For example, sulphate pulp, sulphite pulp, rag pulp, orcombinations thereof, 20 parts by weight, and 30 parts of goat or cattlehair and 6 to 10 parts of caustic soda are beaten out hard for 20minutes in the beater, the hair being beaten out short and the mixtureproducing a slimy mass consisting of gelatinized cellulosic material andalkali-glutinized nitrogenous material with short hairs and fiberstherein, the glutinized portion of the hair being in chemicalcomposition with the alkali. The beater roll is then raised slightly and50 parts of long hair eand subsequently 10 parts of alum are added inthe order stated and the beating continued sufficiently hard to comb outthe hair without cutting it until it is thoroughly individualized. Theaddition of the alum precipitates the alkali-glutinized nitrogenousmaterial from the solution, the reaction producing.

a bulky or flocculent precipitate which aids in fixing both-thegelatinized cellulosic material, the

cellulosic brill and the. shortened hair fragments on the added longhair. Such a procedure is thus advantageous in that aside from the factraw material in the white water when the mixture is formed into a sheetor web on a screen.

.- The use of hair as a basis for glutinized material is furtheradvantageous in that hair is an inexpensive material and is easilyglutinized inthe same operation employed to break it and gelatinize thecellulosic material. 'Ihe proportion of pulp to long hair may beconsiderably greater than the figure given in the foregoing example, inwhich case less of the glutinized hair need be employed.

In place of the mixture of Yshort hair and caustic, leather dissolved ina causticsolution may be employed. -The leather may be dissolved in thecaustic and the solution added to the beater, or the leather may beplaced in the beater in the form of chips of skivings and the causticallowed to act thereon during the beating operation. This.

saponofled oils or fatty acids with the long hair.

'Ihis latter method produces a felt capable of having a greaterproportion of hair of original length than the two previous methods. Forexample, 15 to 90 parts cellulose pulp such as sulphate, rags, cotton,linters or other suitable cellulosic material or combinations thereonare beaten out for about 15 minutes. The beater roll is then raised andhair, 50 to 90 parts, added, together with 20 parts of soap solution.This is circulated in the beater for about an hour with the beater rollsuiiiciently hard down to comb out the hair Without cutting it untileach ber is coat-` ed with the individualizing'agent. The pulp is thenready for the paper machine and should be run quite wet and under heavysuction. This method and furnish are more fully described and claimed inmy Patent No. 1,674,948.

Where hair and caustic or a solution of leather are employed they may beprecipitated in the final product by the alum or other precipitatingagent, thereby producing a harder and more dense product which isincapable of receiving as great a proportion of saturant as thatproduced by the use of the soap solution winch is washed out in thefelting operation. The soap might, also, however, be precipitated, ifdesired, by the use of alum, but this would not produce so hard a sheetas when short hair and caustic, or the leather solution is employed. Anyother material which becomes slimy in the beater engine, such as talc orasbestos fibers may be used as the individualizing agent.

It is important that the furnish for the coating plies and intermediateplies contain a substantial proportion of pulp ber and that the ber inthe various plies be of substantially the same freeness so that theplies will all unite when being run in the paper machine. For thisreason, if sulphate pulp is used for the intermediate plies or layerscontaining the hair, it may be hydrated, or the furnish for these layersmay be sized as by treatingl with silicate of soda or rosin size andalum, the particular treatment of course depending on the nature of thefiber used for the surfacing layer or layers. The composite sheetmaterial as it comes from the paper machine is preferably ironed inorder to produce a smooth printing surface. It may then be saturatedwith asphalt or other bituminous or resinous substances as may bedesired for the particular purpose intended, the surface formed by theouter smooth stock being printed or otherwise treated. as with aosaaas adrying oil such as linseed oil to produce the particular surface finishdesired. In forming the composite sheet or board, the Wet webs of orcontaining pulp are brought into close facial contact, and are more orless interfelted and bonded together, so that they Will not separate inthe process of saturating with bitumen, or in the nished product. Byforming the sheet including the hair felt portion on a paper machine,the well known and desirable characteristics of such formation such asan intimate interfelting and resistance to tearing are obtained.

I claim:-

1. Flooring and the like comprising a ply composed of uniformly feltedhairs of original length, said hairs having thereon a. driedprecipitation of glutinized hair mixed with hair fragments andgelatinized cellulosic material, and a facing ply of felted cellulosicfibrous material bonded and wetfelted to the rst said ply.

2. Flooring and the like comprising a ply composed of uniformly feltedhairs of original length, said hairs having thereon a driedprecipitation of glutinized 'nair mixed with hair fragments andgelatinized cellulosic material, a facing ply of felted cellulosic brousmaterial bonded and wetfelted to the first said ply, and a bituminouscompound permeating both said plies.

l ply of hair of original length mixed and uniformly felted with anapproximtely equal quantity of cellulosic pulp and sized, said plyhaving the characteristics of paper machine fabrication, and surfacingplies of cellulosic pulp bonded to and interfelted with said centralply, all said plies being saturated with bituminous material.

5. Flooring and the like comprising a central ply of hair of originallength mixed and uniformly felted with an approximately equal quantityof cellulosic pulp and sized, said ply having the characteristics ofpaper machine fabrication, relatively smooth surfacing plies ofcellulosic pulp bonded to and interfelted with said central ply, allsaid plies being saturated with bituminous material, and a finishingcoat of a drying oil on one of said surfacing plies.

ALBERT L. CLAPP.

